Antarctic Climate-Change Research

Robotic submarine project

Scientists from Northern Illinois
University will deploy a new 28-foot long, cigar-shaped robotic submarine to be used in exploration beneath the Ross Ice Shelf in
Antarctica.

The robotic submarine will allow
scientists for the first time ever to observe melting and other conditions at
the interface between seawater and the base of the glacial ice.

The 2,200-pound submarine is
scheduled to be tested in Lake Tahoe in the fall of 2011.

ANDRILL Project

Few efforts to improve our
understanding of global warming have been more ambitious or larger in scale
than ANDRILL — a $30 million international project involving some 150
scientists and led in part by Northern Illinois University geologist Ross
Powell.

Powell and other NIU
scientists and students worked to
recover and decipher geologic records buried deep within the Antarctic sea bed.
These records, in the form of rock core samples, provide scientists with a
wealth of information about the continent’s climate history. Ultimately, that
information has led to a better understanding of contemporary global warming
trends.